Bank of America Hit With $1.2 Billion Penalty Over Anti-Money Laundering Failures

US Treasury says the country’s second-largest bank “willfully” violated the Bank Secrecy Act and failed to report more than $5 billion in suspicious transactions

October 14, 2026

The US Treasury Department fined Bank of America more than $1.2 billion on Tuesday for violating anti-money laundering and sanctions laws. The penalties came from three federal agencies.

The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) assessed a $1.2 billion penalty over the bank’s failure to mitigate and report priority national security risks. These included Chinese money laundering networks and illicit finance along the southwest border. FinCEN’s total includes credit for a $750 million civil penalty from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), the largest in that agency’s history. The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) separately announced an $11.6 million settlement over apparent violations of sanctions programs covering Iran, Russia, narcotics and terrorism. Combined, the penalties come to about $1.21 billion.

What regulators found

Bank of America admitted it willfully violated the Bank Secrecy Act. It also admitted it failed to maintain an adequate anti-money laundering program, conduct due diligence on correspondent accounts for foreign financial institutions, and file suspicious activity reports.

According to Treasury, the bank failed to report more than $5 billion in suspicious transactions between January 2018 and July 2025. Roughly $1 billion of that carried national security or illicit-finance risks. These included activity linked to Chinese money laundering networks, fraud, and potential trade-based money laundering tied to the southwest border. FinCEN found the bank had effectively outsourced a substantial part of its detection and reporting duties to third parties. It will now work with an outside party to identify and report suspicious transactions it missed.

The OCC said the bank failed to fix its deficiencies as required under a December 2024 cease-and-desist order. “The second largest bank’s egregious and continued BSA violations warrant the OCC imposing its largest CMP ever assessed against a bank,” Comptroller of the Currency Jonathan Gould said, as quoted by CNBC and PYMNTS.

“When a bank of this size fails to meet its anti-money laundering and sanctions obligations, the consequences extend far beyond its own walls,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said.

Where it ranks

The FinCEN penalty is the third-largest in its history, behind Binance’s $3.4 billion in 2023 and TD Bank’s $1.3 billion in 2024. Unlike those two, it comes with no accompanying Justice Department action, according to CNN. CNN also notes it is the largest anti-money laundering fine the Trump administration’s Treasury has levied against a major bank.

Bank’s response

Bank of America said it worked with regulators on the resolutions, which stem from the violations cited in the 2024 OCC consent order and FinCEN’s investigation. The bank had flagged in an August filing that it was still negotiating with the OCC.

Note: The BBC article you linked is blocked on my end, so this is based on reporting from CNN, CNBC, NBC News, The Hill, AP, Al Jazeera and PYMNTS, and on FinCEN’s press release.